DogDaze wrote in post #18002198
Thanks Brian. I can see improvement in my pictures as they progress, but I still am not quite happy with them and I'm not sure why. Possibly I'm being too critical on myself trying to have these magnificent pictures with only months experience. but yes this so far has been a blast
thanks again, Eric
That's exactly it. Your being to critical on yourself. We are all the same way. Some of my shots where I'm like "meh, not my worst" people are like "WOW, that's amazing!" People are always telling me I take awesome photos. Personally I don't see it. But we are our own worst critics. Your photos are better than you think they are. I think most of us here can relate?
I notice your using a flash for your macros. That will help, since your likely hand holding. And getting good light with a fast shutter is next to impossible in the macro world. I've been working at macro myself the past couple years. It's always fun to shoot. Even though, honestly, most times end in disappointment when I get to the computer.
As for aperture, personally I don't see any difference between my own shots f/2.8 or f/16. The focal plane when focusing up close is so minuscule, I honestly don't think aperture makes the least bit of difference as far as depth of field goes. I could be wrong though. The smaller aperture could help knock out some ambient light and allow your subject to stand out more. Also try moving the camera toward and away from your subject to focus. It's very hard to focus on something so small for me. As I have a hard time seeing it well through the view finder. Especially with the lack of light. Also take several shots and sort them out later. Subsequently you could stack your shots to get a larger DoF.
Another thing I've come to realize is most of the "magnificent" pictures of which you speak are heavy crops. I assume your referring to a fly's eyes filling the frame etc...? We can only focus so close, even with macro lenses and/or extension tubes before you need to zoom in on the digital file.
Here's an example of that. It's by no means magnificent. But it show's what I mean. Cropped, resized and rotated a bit. The original is posted below as reference. You have to be careful with this, because to much zooming in can cause noise to appear in the image. Work within the confines of the information which your camera can capture and learn to push those limits. You'll only improve your shots!
I'm no expert with macro, these are just some things I've learned along the way through trial and error.
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